How to Eat (66 page)

8 ounces button mushrooms, sliced thinly

8 ounces chanterelles or other wild mushrooms

8 ounces shiitake mushrooms, stemmed and halved

1 ounce trompettes de mort or other wild mushrooms

2 tablespoons dry sherry

2 tablespoons freshly grated Parmesan

2 tablespoons chopped parsley or 1 tablespoon chopped chives

Put the dried porcini in a large measuring cup and pour over hot but not boiling water from the kettle to come up to the 1¼-cups mark. Put half the butter and the olive oil into a large frying pan. Turn on the heat and then add the shallots and garlic and cook on a low to medium heat for about 15 minutes or until very soft indeed but not browned. A nonstick pan is good for this, as the shallots tend to stew in nonstick pans rather than fry, which is what you want here. After the dried mushrooms have soaked for 20 minutes, strain them, reserving the liquid, and finely chop. Add them to the softened shallot and garlic mixture and then, 2 minutes later, add the rest of the butter and all the mushrooms and cook, covered, for 7–10 minutes, stirring and turning often. You may need longer, but you’ll tell at a glance when they’ve cooked down. Uncover, turn up the heat, add the strained mushroom-soaking liquid and the sherry, and let it all bubble away until the liquid is syrupy. At this point I turn off the heat and leave the mushrooms to cool and be reheated later.

At which point, warm them up and, when hot, add the cheese. Remove to a serving bowl and sprinkle with the parsley or chives.

The three components of this course not only go well together, but the polished-panelling Murillo tones of the mushrooms, the smooth, unsubtle bright orangeness of the pumpkin, the plump, untroubled white of the fish, look wonderful next to one another on the table. And the tastes have the same rightness: the simplicity of the fish, the aromatic earthiness of the mushrooms, the sweetness of the purée—the perfect trio. Don’t introduce a salad or anything else—except bread, preferably a baguette, to soak up the copiously delicious juices.

DESSERT

Fruit and cake are just what you need here; you don’t want to interfere with the simplicity and clarity of what’s gone before. The almond and orange-blossom cake needs to be made a day or so in advance (the recipe for it is on
page 115
); serve any fruit you want with it, but with a damp cake like this fragrant one, no cream. Raspberries are my favorite, but they may be too expensive or too flavorless, or just nonexistent. Some stores stock European brands of bottled, not-too-sweet red cherries; drained, with some of the syrup reduced and spooned over them, they’d be just right. But never disparage the frozen package of mixed fruit; grate some orange zest over before thawing and dust them with confectioners’ sugar before serving.

Try a Spanish red, ideally from the Ribeiro del Duero region, which has a fleshy, flinty quality and is harmonious and generous in character.

SIX IDEAS FOR KITCHEN SUPPERS

As all my meals are eaten in the kitchen, the demarcation between the recipes to follow and those you’ve just read is meaningless. But, interior design apart, we all know what we mean by a kitchen supper. I take it to be a meal without a procession of courses, just food on the table, and not necessarily much notice in which to plan or cook it (although do look at Cooking in Advance,
page 75
, as most of the recipes there are for just this sort of laid-back thing). As far as I’m concerned, if sausages and mash (with apple rings fried in butter, please, like my grandmother used to make for me) would be appropriate fare, a tub of good, bought ice cream an acceptable dessert, and it’s in the evening, it’s a kitchen supper.

All recipes serve four abundantly, which is the way I like it.

BLAKEAN FISH PIE

So-called because the intense yellow of the saffron-tinted sauce reminds me of one of those beautiful Blakean sunbursts. The saffron itself adds more than just depth of color; it headily redeems the bland, cotton-woolly fish you buy in those plastic-wrapped polystyrene trays at the supermarket—useful when you can’t get to a fish seller.

You can cook the potatoes first, mash, and set them aside while preparing the fish, or, if it suits you better, cook the fish and sauce first, set them aside, and do the potatoes after.

1 medium carrot, peeled, halved lengthwise, and quartered

½ cup white wine

large pinch salt

1 bouquet garni (see
page xx
)

2 pounds floury potatoes, cut into chunks

8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter

8 ounces cod fillets, skin removed

8 ounces haddock fillets, skin removed

8 ounces salmon fillets, skin removed

about ½ cup light cream

¼ cup Italian 00 or all-purpose flour

pinch mace

½ teaspoon powdered saffron or ground saffron threads

5 ounces cooked, peeled shrimp

whole nutmeg

Put the carrot in a deep frying pan with ½ cup water, the wine, salt, and bouquet garni. Bring to the boil, turn off the heat, let cool, and reserve. Cook the potatoes in salted water and mash with 6 tablespoons of the butter. (The best instrument for this is a potato ricer. It’s cheap and you don’t need to peel the potatoes; the skins stay behind as you push the potato through.) Set aside.

Put the white fish in the reserved carroty water and wine, bring to simmering point, and poach for about 3 minutes. Remove to a plate, and add the salmon and poach for about 3 minutes. Add to this the white fish. Strain the liquid (keeping the bouquet garni) into a measuring cup, and make up to 2 cups with the cream.

Melt the remaining 2 tablespoons butter in a saucepan and stir in the flour and mace. Cook, stirring, for a few minutes. Then, off the heat, stir in the cream mixture slowly, beating all the time to prevent lumps. When it’s all incorporated, put back on the heat and throw in the sodden bouquet garni. Keep cooking and stirring until thickened—about 5 minutes—then add the saffron powder or threads and cook, stirring, for another 5 minutes. Set aside for 10 minutes (or, if you’re doing this in advance, let it cool altogether).

Butter a 5½-cup dish and put in the cooked fish and the shrimp. Pour over the saffron sauce (take out the bouquet garni) and mix in. Cover with the mashed potato. Make sure the potato completely covers the pie dish so that no sauce can bubble up and spill over. Grate over some nutmeg and cook in an oven, preheated to 375°F, for 20–40 minutes (depending on how cold the pie was when it went in) or until the potatoes are golden here and there and the filling is hot. Eat with peas. You must.

THE IRISH CLUB’S IRISH STEW

When I was a child I remember eating a distinctly nasty Irish stew: watery, greasy, and singularly unvoluptuous. I haven’t been particularly won round by eating it in Ireland, either. But I recently had a bowlful at the Irish Club in London’s Eaton Square, and it was velvety in its unctuousness, the meat and its gravy both infused with that sweet, tender viscosity. I don’t think I have ever been so bowled over by something I’ve ordered. Actually, I didn’t order it, or not initially. I had played safe and asked for the Irish smoked salmon with soda bread. But then I tasted the stew and felt pierced with envy. I am happy to eat from other people’s plates; indeed, I don’t feel there’s any point going out if I can’t do that. But this was different: I wanted my own, and lots of it. The Irish Club’s Irish Stew, with its inclusion of veal stock (and chicken stock, for that matter), and whole lamb chops, which diners gnaw on, may offend purists, but experiences as voluptuous and pleasurable as this are always going to offend them anyway. Don’t worry about making your own veal stock—there are good commercial versions available—but it’s important not to leave it out, as that’s what produces, or helps produce, the requisite seductive stickiness.

¾ cup pearl barley

3 pounds rib lamb chops not less than 1 inch thick, trimmed of any fat

5 medium onions, chopped, or 12 boiling onions

5 medium carrots, peeled and chopped, or 12 baby ones, peeled

3 large parsnips, peeled and chopped

1¼ cups chicken stock

1¼ cups veal stock

salt and freshly milled black pepper

leaves from a medium rosemary sprig, minced

3 sage leaves, minced

1 tablespoon chopped parsley

8 medium potatoes, peeled and sliced about ¼ inch thick

Cook the barley 20 minutes in boiling salted water, drain it, and reserve.

Preheat the oven to 325°F. In a casserole in which you’re sure everything’s going to fit, brown the lamb. You shouldn’t need to add any cooking fat to the pan. Remove the meat. Add the vegetables to the casserole, turn them in the fat, and cook for about 5 minutes, stirring frequently, until slightly softened. Meanwhile, combine the stocks and heat.

Remove the vegetables to a plate for a moment, then layer the casserole with the chops, the vegetables, and the parboiled barley, seasoning well with the salt and pepper and sprinkling with rosemary, sage, and parsley as you go. Pour over the warmed stock and arrange the potatoes on top overlapping like a tiled roof, and season again. Cover the casserole so that the potatoes steam inside. Put in the oven for 1½ hours, or until the potatoes are soft and the meat is thoroughly cooked. If you want the potatoes browned on top, dot with butter and blitz under the broiler or in a turned-up oven when cooked.

The whole point of this stew is that it needs no accompaniment—except for bread, and lots of it.

SPANISH STEW

This stew is both plain and yet intensely flavored—the thickly sliced, fat-pearled, paprika-bright sausages ooze oily and orange into the sherry-spiked broth; the potatoes cook placidly alongside. It takes a few minutes to assemble, and then you just stick it in the oven. The thing that does make a difference is the chorizo itself; you need the proper, semidried (sometimes called fresh) sausages rather than the naturally drier and stouter-waisted salami. What you must guard against are those tight-fleshed, too lean and unyielding, so-called Spanish-style chorizo.

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 medium onion, minced

3 garlic cloves, finely minced

8 ounces semidried chorizo sausages, sliced thickly

1 bay leaf

½ cup dry sherry

2¼ pounds waxy potatoes, halved

salt and freshly milled black pepper

3–4 tablespoons chopped coriander

Preheat the oven to 400°F. Pour some water into a kettle and bring to a boil.

Put the oil in a wide rather than deep pan that will go in the oven later—an oblong enameled casserole or round terra-cotta dish or suchlike—and put over medium-low heat. Add the onion and cook for 5 minutes or so, until beginning to soften. Add the garlic and cook, stirring, for another couple of minutes. Add the chorizo, the bay leaf, and the sherry, stir, and add the potatoes. Stir and pour over water from the kettle to cover, but only just; don’t worry about the odd potato poking above water-level. Simmer for 10 minutes and season with the salt and pepper.

Put the dish in the oven, uncovered, and cook for 35–40 minutes, or until hot and the potatoes are tender but not crumbling. Remove, ladle into bowls, and sprinkle over the coriander as you hand them round. You need lots of (unbuttered) bread with this, but not much else—perhaps a pale, crunchy, and astringent salad after.

ONE-PAN CHICKEN

This is very easy, very quick. Don’t be too hung up about the quantities below; they’re nothing more than a guideline.

olive oil

1 3½-pound chicken, cut into 8 pieces

2¼ pounds new potatoes, cut into ½-inch dice

3 medium red onions, cut into segments

16 garlic cloves, unpeeled

3 red peppers, seeded and quartered

coarse sea salt

½ cup chopped parsley

Preheat the oven to 425°F.

Get 2 baking dishes and pour in some olive oil to coat. Arrange the pieces of chicken, the potatoes, onions, garlic cloves, and peppers on them. (If you want to use 3 dishes and have got the room, do; the less packed everything is, the crisper the potatoes will be.) Then drizzle some more oil over, making sure everything’s glossy and well slicked (but not dripping), sprinkle with the salt, and bake for about 45 minutes.

When done (and test all component parts), strew over the parsley and—I always do this—serve straight from the baking dishes. A green salad’s all you need with it, but puy lentils do go well.

INVOLTINI

Don’t serve this dish of provolone-stuffed fried eggplant piping hot, but warm. The quantities of stuffing make enough for 12 rolls, so I sauté only the best 12 slices of eggplant and then stop. If you feel 3 rolls per head will just not do, scale up accordingly. I never salt eggplant; just make sure you buy ones that are bouncily firm and shiny. You can cook the eggplant in advance, if you like; also, if you prefer, strew additional provolone over the involtini rather than mozzarella before baking.